Snapcraft packages need to be self-contained. While it is often possible to manually install gnome-keyring, there has to be a way to take care of this internally in the Snapcraft package.
The cause of this issue seems to be that the secret management library used by mailspring (keytar) depends on libsecret… which KDE does not support when first installed.
The solutions to this problem would seem to be one of the following:
Prompt or document that the user must install gnome-keyring (or something else that supports libsecret)
Change key management library to one that supports kwallet, or one that can be self-contained within a snap
Update keytar to support kwallet
Update kwallet/KDE to support libsecret
In hindsight I probably shouldn’t have closed this issue, as I agree with @Lvaskz that in theory a snap should be self contained.
Personally there is very little incentive for me to spend time trying to fix this issue as I rarley nowadays use desktop linux or a desktop mail client.
Just decided to try Mailspring, and, well, now I encountered this issue after installing it on arch using an AUR helper. I’ve never had this with any other program, and I don’t really quite understand why you can’t use a more generic solution that’s more convenient to users? Seems like from the list you’re suggesting, you’ll still require something like KDE wallet or GNOME keyring to be installed, can’t this just use libsecret or something?
(Not that they’re bad or anything, it’s just that the solutions, even if would work very well for GNOME and KDE, would still be limiting to most uses that don’t use KDE or GNOME software, and depending on libsecret would probably make this process seamless for a lot of users).
Quite probably, but the timeline is foggy, as with everything.
As a rule, all updates will be posted on the thread. If there are none posted, there are no updates. Your patience is appreciated. Mailspring is built and maintained by volunteers — even the core developer does this in addition to a full time job.
As a rule, asking for updates, status, or timeframe won’t hurry things along. If you want to help get a bug resolved or feature implemented quicker, here’s some things you can do, depending on your available time and skills:
Vote. This raises the priority in planning. Anyone can do this.
Help diagnose. Checking logs, testing out scenarios, or even digging around in the code if you’re up to the challenge all help move towards a resolution.
Coordinate with other reporters. If you see similar bug reports, possible duplicates, or other posts with hints, helping get those individuals involved in diagnostics helps a lot!
Attempting a PR. If you know anything about coding — even a little — you can check out the Mailspring source code from GitHub and try to fix the bug or implement the feature yourself. Even if you aren’t successful, or the fix isn’t ideal, the attempt still helps us!
And, of course, you can help just by being involved in the community: helping answer questions, triage bugs, and discuss features takes pressure off the developers, so they have time to focus on writing awesome code.
I’m using Fedora, and KDE, and I get the error message about libsecret as well. I do have gnome-keyring installed however, so what can I do to make Mailspring run?
I had to drop Mailspring for another client due to this issue.
I am using Manjaro KDE Plasma and it was working fine from AUR until recently.
I had to do a fresh install (hw changes) and now I am not able to run Mailspring.
Previously I was installing “gnome-keyring” and then Mailspring from AUR.
Now, it is not available from AUR.
I tired the Flatpak version (with “gnome-keyring”), does not work.
I tried the Snap version, worked the 1st time, now I cannot run it again.
I need to get my emails, so I reverted to another client. Not happy but I cannot wait for this to get fixed.
I have a solution for those that still have not fixed this issue.
I use VS Code for web development and recently I was having an error with the keyring issue. It just started a few weeks ago but never really posed an issue with my workflow, so I never paid it any attention.
When I decided to give MailSpring a try (thanks to DT@YouTube) and it too was giving me a keyring/libsecret issue. Upon investigating on Microsoft site for VS Code, they recommended installing sudo pacman -S gnome-keyring libsecret libgnome-keyring.
BOOM, errors are gone.
No more nagging error in VS Code and MailSpring finally is running for me. At first, I was not even able to create my account.
Now all is well.
I hope this solution works for you. I use Arch BTW
